there were a couple of conflicts even during the earlier years; not just the Heinrich one in 1749, but also two with AW himself in 1750 and 1755, both about matters concerning Fritz's handling of AW's regiments, i.e. Fritz going over his head and AW taking it very personally (mentions of honour and feeling useless included).
Ziebura does include those in her AW biography, and provides earlier context; the sense of being useless (and the idea of being regarded as useless by Fritz, specifically) starts between Silesian Wars, she says, when otoh AW is made Prince of Prussia (and hence officially designated as heir), but so far out of the loop for anything military and political that he has no idea Fritz will start the second Silesian War a week before it happens, as opposed to his correspondent Ferdinand of Braunschweig (EC's military gifted brother), who does. And then kid brother Heinrich, still a teenager, gets his Marschbefehl before AW does. Why Fritz didn't order both of them to join the army at the same time is Fritz' mystery. BTW, on the positive side, Ziebura says Fritz continued his campaign to get AW reading and to encourage him to self educate well into his kingship through their correspondence, and that AW responds positively as can be seen not just via letters but in his library including not just all the books Fritz reccommended but a lot more. Ziebura also analyses the memoranda AW wrote after the second Silesian War with "What I'd do were I in charge of Prussia" ideas. All of which seems to me coming down to: like Fritz, AW was the son of a workoholic who'd preached to all his kids that idleness was one of the worst sins ever and a man wasn't a man if he wasn't a) working, and b) also a respected soldier. And while FW was paranoia itself, he did put Crown Prince Fritz to work in terms other than military drill ones (the whole Küstrin "reeducation" procedure did include a crash course in economics, after all, and the duty to participate in Küstrin civilian administration. This was the basis of comparison AW had for how a sovereign treats a crown prince at his age. Whereas from Fritz, he gets mainly "go forth and multiply" instructions, gets absolutely no intel on the war(s) going on (and since Fritz was an active campaigner, Fritz could have died; the prospect of suddenly becoming King with zero knowledge of what's going on must have been terrifying); and then, when it's peacetime again and he does get regimental (drilling) duties, Fritz is micromanaging there, too. It would be hard not to wonder "does Fritz think I'm stupid and incapable?" under those circumstances.
(Whereas Fritz probably thought he was doing young AW a favor when not shoving responsibilities on him and letting him enjoy his youth a bit longer, plus his paranoia was even greater than FW's.)
Biche letter: I had come across it, I think in one of the Volz anthologies but I'm not sure, and agree, it's adorable, too. Also, tsk, Biche, cheating on Folichon with Mylord.
Amusing: November 1746, there are rumours that G2 might be dying. Says Fritz: If that's true, there will be a battle between him and our father at Pluto's. AW's answer: I'm sure one can talk to each other in the hereafter and I'm sure our father will treat him drastically and won't skimp on the most exquisite insults.
LOL. Good to know FW's sons feel the same popcorn glee about the FW/G2 feud as we do. (Mind you, we later borns can conclude G2 and FW were exactly as bad as each other and thus part of the fun is rooting for neither, whereas I expect Fritz and AW would not have been rooting for Uncle George.)
It's on this fine line between sweet/playful and impatient/admonishing and where the relationship goes from there is quite open at that point, but turns into tragedy ten years later.
I think part of the inherent tragedy is also that Fritz, as sovereign, has taken over the father role for his siblings in addition to the older brother role. Because mutual fraternal ribbing is possible and enjoyable in their society, but you can't tease Dad The King back (unless you're Charlotte), not in their family, at least.
Even Fritz' accusation of only listening to flattery/the wrong people shows up way earlier and when AW wants him to name names, Fritz only answers with "I see you want to involve me in a drawn-out argument, not happening, I'm done".
Now this is fascinating, and I can't make up my mind on various possibilities, such as:
1.) Fritz is simply evoking a trope. Which "you're listening to flattery/the wrong people" really really is for their day. It's the standard criticism of princes, both in and out of power. Of course, Fritz - who levels this charge at quite a number of princes, from Louis XV to the Hannover relations - prided himself on being immune to this, which is very much NOT what fond but critical observers like later Mitchell think (see his remarks on Fritz & the two Roman named guys, Lentulus & Quintus Icilius, for example). (And of course all the way back to the Crown Prince days, FW used this very trope against Fritz when accusing him of only listening to flatterers while disliking all his father's friends, etc. Always trust Fritz to reproduce his father's insults towards someone else.) Meaning: the reason why Fritz doesn't counter with specific names is that he can't think of any, he just used the trope.
2.) Fritz means Heinrich and wants to avoid another Heinrich argument. Argument for this: not just hindsight but contemporary sources like Tyrconnel, the French envoy after Valory, name Heinrich as the biggest influence on AW in the early 1750s. Argument against this: Fritz had no problem writing "Heinrich is your idol" and accusing AW of believing him over Fritz in the big 1749 argument. So why being coy this time around if Heinrich was whom he meant?
3.) Fritz means their dear departed father and is unable to say so because he KNOWS it would make him sound jealous. Because it was FW who declared, and not just once, that of all his children, AW was the one in whose future success and greatness he was confident.
4.) Fritz actually literally means what he says, people from AW's circle of friends. The problem here is the same as when Henri de Catt later reports him fuming against unnamed evil flatterers turning AW against him - why not call a spade a spade and say who? Also, if we go by those friends who were actually around AW till (nearly, since he self isolated in his last weeks) the end, other than family members and servants, these would be basically Isaac de Forcade (later appointed by Fritz as Hofmarschall to future FW2 after Borcke was fired, so hardly a suspect for anti-Fritzian sentiments to him) and Lehndorff (definitely someone prone to talk very complimentary to and about AW, but never encouraging him to feud with the King).
What do you think?
I was rather amused by a "the Stoics are tyrants, Epicurism all the way" letter from 1748. Unfortunately, Volz doesn't include the AW letter that prompted it (and Preuss has neither of them), but the context was Fritz taking the waters and everything that went with it, so I guess AW must have said something about Fritz' abstinence or something. Fritz then feels compelled to write a whole letter on natural drives and not suppressing them - he himself totally doesn't! - and I'm still wondering to what extent he's talking about sex here, when he lists hunger, sleep, and pleasure ("when our life and nature have accumulated surplus energy") as the three drives.
Ha. I'm having trouble not to read "pleasure" as sex in this context, either. BTW, two years later, AW discusses Epicure with Maupertuis in letters and unsuprisingly is pro Epicure, too. Maupertuis specifically points out that there are pleasures other than sex and argues that the enjoyment when listening to beautiful music, or reading books, or having interesting conversations may not be as strong as the one you have during sex with a lover, but on the plus side it doesn't weaken the body or distract the soul from duty, so these pleasures are preferable, Monseigneur. As to whether AW in 1750 instinctively defining pleasure as sexual pleasure until this is pointed out to him by Maupertuis supports or argues against Fritz using the term in the same sense - I could see it either way.
Re: Fritz/AW Correspondence
Ziebura does include those in her AW biography, and provides earlier context; the sense of being useless (and the idea of being regarded as useless by Fritz, specifically) starts between Silesian Wars, she says, when otoh AW is made Prince of Prussia (and hence officially designated as heir), but so far out of the loop for anything military and political that he has no idea Fritz will start the second Silesian War a week before it happens, as opposed to his correspondent Ferdinand of Braunschweig (EC's military gifted brother), who does. And then kid brother Heinrich, still a teenager, gets his Marschbefehl before AW does. Why Fritz didn't order both of them to join the army at the same time is Fritz' mystery. BTW, on the positive side, Ziebura says Fritz continued his campaign to get AW reading and to encourage him to self educate well into his kingship through their correspondence, and that AW responds positively as can be seen not just via letters but in his library including not just all the books Fritz reccommended but a lot more. Ziebura also analyses the memoranda AW wrote after the second Silesian War with "What I'd do were I in charge of Prussia" ideas. All of which seems to me coming down to: like Fritz, AW was the son of a workoholic who'd preached to all his kids that idleness was one of the worst sins ever and a man wasn't a man if he wasn't a) working, and b) also a respected soldier. And while FW was paranoia itself, he did put Crown Prince Fritz to work in terms other than military drill ones (the whole Küstrin "reeducation" procedure did include a crash course in economics, after all, and the duty to participate in Küstrin civilian administration. This was the basis of comparison AW had for how a sovereign treats a crown prince at his age. Whereas from Fritz, he gets mainly "go forth and multiply" instructions, gets absolutely no intel on the war(s) going on (and since Fritz was an active campaigner, Fritz could have died; the prospect of suddenly becoming King with zero knowledge of what's going on must have been terrifying); and then, when it's peacetime again and he does get regimental (drilling) duties, Fritz is micromanaging there, too. It would be hard not to wonder "does Fritz think I'm stupid and incapable?" under those circumstances.
(Whereas Fritz probably thought he was doing young AW a favor when not shoving responsibilities on him and letting him enjoy his youth a bit longer, plus his paranoia was even greater than FW's.)
Biche letter: I had come across it, I think in one of the Volz anthologies but I'm not sure, and agree, it's adorable, too. Also, tsk, Biche, cheating on Folichon with Mylord.
Amusing: November 1746, there are rumours that G2 might be dying. Says Fritz: If that's true, there will be a battle between him and our father at Pluto's. AW's answer: I'm sure one can talk to each other in the hereafter and I'm sure our father will treat him drastically and won't skimp on the most exquisite insults.
LOL. Good to know FW's sons feel the same popcorn glee about the FW/G2 feud as we do. (Mind you, we later borns can conclude G2 and FW were exactly as bad as each other and thus part of the fun is rooting for neither, whereas I expect Fritz and AW would not have been rooting for Uncle George.)
It's on this fine line between sweet/playful and impatient/admonishing and where the relationship goes from there is quite open at that point, but turns into tragedy ten years later.
I think part of the inherent tragedy is also that Fritz, as sovereign, has taken over the father role for his siblings in addition to the older brother role. Because mutual fraternal ribbing is possible and enjoyable in their society, but you can't tease Dad The King back (unless you're Charlotte), not in their family, at least.
Even Fritz' accusation of only listening to flattery/the wrong people shows up way earlier and when AW wants him to name names, Fritz only answers with "I see you want to involve me in a drawn-out argument, not happening, I'm done".
Now this is fascinating, and I can't make up my mind on various possibilities, such as:
1.) Fritz is simply evoking a trope. Which "you're listening to flattery/the wrong people" really really is for their day. It's the standard criticism of princes, both in and out of power. Of course, Fritz - who levels this charge at quite a number of princes, from Louis XV to the Hannover relations - prided himself on being immune to this, which is very much NOT what fond but critical observers like later Mitchell think (see his remarks on Fritz & the two Roman named guys, Lentulus & Quintus Icilius, for example). (And of course all the way back to the Crown Prince days, FW used this very trope against Fritz when accusing him of only listening to flatterers while disliking all his father's friends, etc. Always trust Fritz to reproduce his father's insults towards someone else.) Meaning: the reason why Fritz doesn't counter with specific names is that he can't think of any, he just used the trope.
2.) Fritz means Heinrich and wants to avoid another Heinrich argument. Argument for this: not just hindsight but contemporary sources like Tyrconnel, the French envoy after Valory, name Heinrich as the biggest influence on AW in the early 1750s. Argument against this: Fritz had no problem writing "Heinrich is your idol" and accusing AW of believing him over Fritz in the big 1749 argument. So why being coy this time around if Heinrich was whom he meant?
3.) Fritz means their dear departed father and is unable to say so because he KNOWS it would make him sound jealous. Because it was FW who declared, and not just once, that of all his children, AW was the one in whose future success and greatness he was confident.
4.) Fritz actually literally means what he says, people from AW's circle of friends. The problem here is the same as when Henri de Catt later reports him fuming against unnamed evil flatterers turning AW against him - why not call a spade a spade and say who? Also, if we go by those friends who were actually around AW till (nearly, since he self isolated in his last weeks) the end, other than family members and servants, these would be basically Isaac de Forcade (later appointed by Fritz as Hofmarschall to future FW2 after Borcke was fired, so hardly a suspect for anti-Fritzian sentiments to him) and Lehndorff (definitely someone prone to talk very complimentary to and about AW, but never encouraging him to feud with the King).
What do you think?
I was rather amused by a "the Stoics are tyrants, Epicurism all the way" letter from 1748. Unfortunately, Volz doesn't include the AW letter that prompted it (and Preuss has neither of them), but the context was Fritz taking the waters and everything that went with it, so I guess AW must have said something about Fritz' abstinence or something. Fritz then feels compelled to write a whole letter on natural drives and not suppressing them - he himself totally doesn't! - and I'm still wondering to what extent he's talking about sex here, when he lists hunger, sleep, and pleasure ("when our life and nature have accumulated surplus energy") as the three drives.
Ha. I'm having trouble not to read "pleasure" as sex in this context, either. BTW, two years later, AW discusses Epicure with Maupertuis in letters and unsuprisingly is pro Epicure, too. Maupertuis specifically points out that there are pleasures other than sex and argues that the enjoyment when listening to beautiful music, or reading books, or having interesting conversations may not be as strong as the one you have during sex with a lover, but on the plus side it doesn't weaken the body or distract the soul from duty, so these pleasures are preferable, Monseigneur. As to whether AW in 1750 instinctively defining pleasure as sexual pleasure until this is pointed out to him by Maupertuis supports or argues against Fritz using the term in the same sense - I could see it either way.